Earnings Reports Will Dominate Wall Street

A heavy load of corporate earnings reports will dominate Wall Street this week, as one-third of the Standard & Poor’s 500, or 181 companies, are slated to report quarterly results.

In the midst of the corporate reports, Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan is scheduled to testify Wednesday before the House Financial Services Committee on the state of the economy.

He will probably be helped by statistics due out Tuesday on production at U.S. factories, mines and utilities during June. Industrial production declined in the previous eight months. Tuesday’s report also will include plant-use rate.

“Manufacturing is still bleeding because of the strong dollar, weak global demand and weak domestic demand,” said Richard Yamarone, chief economist at Argus Research Corp. in New York.

Still, the manufacturing slump may have reached bottom. The Philadelphia Fed’s regional manufacturing report Thursday is expected to show an index of minus 1 in July, compared with a minus 3.7 reading a month earlier. While that reading would still show contraction, it would be the highest since a positive 4.7 in November.

Part of the improvement may be because businesses are bringing inventories in line with slow sales.

Stockpiles at U.S. businesses are expected to have declined in May, the fourth consecutive month without an increase, analysts said. The Commerce Department is scheduled to release that report today.